Have you ever felt like you just didn't connect with God
during a worship service? You showed up, ready to praise the Lord, but the
service felt empty, dry, or just boring. Or maybe your mind was just everywhere
but on God, with so many things running through your head - your to do list,
your grocery list, stress at work, your children's sports schedules… oh wait,
were we supposed to be praying just now?
Yes, I’ve had Sundays that felt just like that. And I’m the worship leader.
There’s a couple of things to consider when worship feels
dull…
First, our feelings don’t always tell the whole story. Jesus
said, “For where 2 or 3 gather in my name, there I am with them” (Matthew
18:20). So whether we feel God’s presence among us or not, He is right there
with us. He is Emmanuel, God with us. He meets us where we are. So when we are
scattered, bored, annoyed, sad, or lonely, God meets us there. It isn’t the
worship leader’s job to lead us into the presence of God… simply coming
together in the name of Jesus means we are in the presence of the Almighty God.
It is our responsibility as worshippers – whether in leadership or not- to
cultivate our awareness of His nearness. Hebrews 11:6 reminds us that God
rewards those who earnestly seek Him. How would our outlook of a church service
change if we came, expecting to find God in our midst? How would we change if
we made an active choice to believe that God would be there with us no matter
how we felt?
Secondly, we cannot worship well a God that we do not know.
When I was in college studying music, I remember being rather bored when I had
to listen to recitals given by students that I didn’t know. Since I knew
nothing of their ability, their style, their education, their performance meant
little to me. I felt like I was hearing the same old pieces of music over and
over again. But when I listened to the senior recital given by my future
husband, I was enraptured. I was invested in him personally, as his fiancé, and
musically, in his performance – I had listened to him practice for hours on
end, worked through difficult passages with him, discussed the composers of his
pieces, and worked hard to accompany him for part of the recital. My investment
in him as a person and in his work made his recital exciting and important to
me.
The same is true with Jesus. If I am not very invested in
Him, then spending time in a worship service probably won’t be that meaningful
to me. But when I spend time with Him, daily wrestling with His Word, working
hard to know Him better, sharing my life journey through prayer, seeking to
accompany His work, then I am far more excited to spend time worshiping Him
alongside of my church family.
My question is this: how can I adjust my time so that I have
a little more time to dig deeper spiritually? How can I spend my time more
wisely so that I can invest it in Jesus? What would change if I closed my
browser and opened my Bible? Would I be different if I spent some time on my
smartphone studying a Bible app instead of Facebook? What will you do?
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